To Comply or not to Comply ?

On 16 April 2018 The UEFA Club Financial Control Body (CFCB) adjudicatory chamber took decisions in the cases of four clubs that had been referred to it by the CFCB chief investigator, concerning the non-fulfilment of the club licensing criteria defined in the UEFA Club Licensing and Financial Fair Play Regulations.

Such criteria must be complied with by the clubs in order to be granted the licence required to enter the UEFA club competitions.

The cases of two clubs::

Olympique des Alpes SA (Sion Switzerland )

and

FC Irtysh (Kazakhstan)

are of particular interest to those following the events under which the SFA awarded a UEFA License to Rangers FC in 2011 currently under investigation by the SFA Compliance Officer because

The case documentation tell us how UEFA wish national associations to apply UEFA FFP rules

The cases tell us what might have happened to Rangers FC in 2012 had they not gone into liquidation and as a consequence avoided the same type of sanctions that UEFA applied to Sion and Irtysh.

FC Sion (Olympique des Alpes SA)

Here we are told how the Swiss FL and then the UEFA CFCB acted in respect of FC Sion in 2017 where a misleading statement was made in the Sion UEFA licensing application.

In April 2017 the Swiss FL (SFL) granted a licence to Sion FC but indicated that a Disciplinary case was pending.

In July 2017 the CFCB, as part of their licence auditing programme, carried out a compliance audit on 3 clubs to determine if licences had been properly awarded. Sion was one of those clubs.

The subsequent audit by Deloitte LLP discovered Sion had an overdue payable on a player, amounting to €950,000, owed to another football club (FC Sochaux ) at 31st March 2017 as a result of a transfer undertaken by Sion before 31st December 2016, although the €950,000 was paid in early June 2017.

Deloitte produced a draft report of their findings that was passed to SFL and Sion for comment on factual accuracy and comment on the findings. Sion responded quickly enabling Deloitte to present a final report to the CFCB Investigation Unit. In response to the Deloitte final report Sion stated:

“it now appears that there was indeed an outstanding commitment arising from transfer activity. This is admitted”

What emerged as the investigation proceeded was that the Swiss FL Licensing Committee, after granting the license in April and as a result of a Sochaux complaint of non-payment to FIFA, had reason to refer Sion’s application to their Disciplinary Commission in May 2017 with regard to the submission of potentially misleading information by FC Sion to the SFL on 7th April 2017 as part of its licensing documentation.

Sion had declared

“Written confirmation: no overdue payables arising from transfer activities”, signed by the Club’s president, stating that as at 31 March 2017 there were no overdue payables towards other football clubs. In particular, the Club indicated that the case between FC Sion and FC Sochaux regarding the transfer of the player Ishmael Yartey was still under dispute.

The SFL Disciplinary Commission came to the conclusion that FC Sion had no intention to mislead the SFL, but indeed submitted some incorrect licensing documentation; the SFL Disciplinary Commission further confirmed that the total amount of €950,000 had been paid by the Club to FC Sochaux on 7 June 2017. Because of the inaccurate information submitted, the SFL Disciplinary Commission decided to impose a fine of CHF 8,000 on the Club.

Whilst this satisfied the SFL Disciplinary process the CFCB deemed it not enough to justify the granting of the licence as UEFA intended their FFP rules to be applied.

Sion provided the CFCB with a number of reasons on the basis of which no sanction should be imposed. In particular, the Club admitted that there was an overdue payable as at 31 March 2017, but stated that the mistake in the document dated 7 April 2017 was the result of a misinterpretation by the club’s responsible person for dealing with the licence (the “Club’s licence manager”), who is not a lawyer. The Club affirmed that it never had the intention to conceal the information and had provisioned the amount due for payment and that, in any case, it has already been sanctioned by the SFL for providing the wrong information.

The CFCB Investigation Unit accepted that the Sion application, although inaccurate, was a one off misrepresentation and not a forgery, (as in intended to deceive ) but that nevertheless an overdue payable did exist at 31st March and a licence should not have been granted.

Based on their findings, the CFCB Chief Investigator decided to refer the case to the CFCB Adjudicatory Chamber and suggested a disciplinary measure to be imposed on FC Sion by the CFCB Adjudicatory Chamber, such measure consisting of a fine of €235,000, corresponding to the UEFA Revenues the Club gained by participating in the 2017/2018 UEFA Europa League.

The CFCB Investigatory Chamber submitted that it was appropriate to impose a fine corresponding to all the UEFA revenues the Club gained by participating in the competition considering the fact that FC Sion should not have been admitted to the competition for failing to meet one of its admission criteria.

The Adjudicatory Chambers took all the circumstances (see paras 91 to 120 at http://tiny.cc/i8sxsy ) into consideration and reached the following key decisions.

FC Sion failed to satisfy the requirements of Article 49(1) of the CL&FFP Regulations and it obtained the licence issued by the SFL not in accordance with the CL&FFP Regulations.

To exclude FC Sion from participating in the next UEFA club competition for which it would otherwise qualify in the next two (2) seasons (i.e. the 2018/19 and 2019/20).

To impose a fine of two hundred and thirty five thousand Euros (€235,000) on FC Sion.

FC Sion is to pay three thousand Euros (€3,000) towards the costs of these proceedings.

Comment in respect of the award of a UEFA Licence in 2011 to Rangers FC.

It is now public knowledge that an actual liability of tax due before 31stDecember 2010 towards HMRC, was admitted by Rangers FC before 31st March 2011.

This liability was described as “potential” in Rangers Interim accounts audited by Grant Thornton.

“Note 1: The exceptional item reflects a provision for a potential tax liability in relation to a Discounted Option Scheme associated with player contributions between 1999 and 2003. A provision for interest of £0.9m has also been included within the interest charge.”

The English Oxford Dictionary definition of potential is:

Having or showing the capacity to develop into something in the future.

Which was not true as the liability had already been “developed” so could not be potential.

This was repeated by Chairman Alistair Johnson in his covering Interim Accounts statement

“The exceptional item reflects a provision for a potential tax liability in relation to a Discounted Option Scheme associated with player contributions between 1999 and 2003. “ where he also added

“Discussions are continuing with HMRC to establish a resolution to the assessments raised.”

This could be taken as disputing the liability but In fact the resolution to the assessments raised would have been payment of the actual liability, something that never happened.

In the Sion case it was accepted the misleading statement was a one off misrepresentation, but at the monitoring stages at June 2011 in Ranger’s case the status of the liability continued to be misrepresented and in September the continuing discussions reason was repeated, along with a claim of an instalment paid whose veracity is highly questionable.

The Swiss FL Licensing Committee did at least refer the case to their Disciplinary Committee when they realised a misleading statement might have been made. The SFA however in August 2011, when Sherriff Officers called at Ibrox for payment of the overdue tax , did no such thing and pulled up the drawbridge for six years, one that the Compliance Officer is now finally charged with lowering.

The case of FC Irtysh of Kazakhstan is set out in full at http://tiny.cc/y9sxsy and is a bit more straightforward but is nevertheless useful to compare with events in 2011 in Scotland.

Unlike Rangers FC , FC Irtysh properly disclosed that they had an overdue payable to the Kazakhstan tax authorities at the monitoring point at 30th June 2017. This caused the CFCB Investigatory Unit to seek further information with regard to the position at 31st March

It transpired that Irtysh had declared an overdue payable at 31st March but cited their financial position (awaiting sponsor money) as a reason for non payment to the Kazakhstan FA who accepted it and granted the licence. The outstanding tax was paid in September 2107.

The outcome of the CFCB Investigation was a case put to the CFCB Adjudicatory Chamber who agreed with the CFCB Investigation Unit that a licence should not have been granted and recommended that Irtysh be fined the equivalent of the UEFA prize money, (that had been withheld in any case whilst CFCB investigated.)

The CFCB Adjudicatory Chamber however decided that a fine was not sufficient in sporting deterrent terms and ruled that:

FC Irtysh failed to satisfy the requirements of Article 50bis(1) of the CL&FFP Regulations and it obtained the licence issued by the FFK not in accordance with the CL&FFP Regulations.

To withhold four hundred and forty thousand Euros (€440,000) corresponding to the UEFA revenues FC Irtysh gained by participating in the 2017/2018 UEFA Europa League.

To exclude FC Irtysh from participating in the next UEFA club competition for which it would otherwise qualify in the next three (3) seasons (i.e. the 2018/19, 2019/20 and 2020/21 seasons). This sanction is deferred for a probationary period of (3) three years. This exclusion must be enforced in case the Club participates again in a UEFA club competition having not fulfilled the licence criteria required to obtain the UEFA licence in accordance with the CL&FFP Regulations.

FC Irtysh is to pay three thousand Euros (€3,000) towards the costs of these proceedings. “

The deferral was because unlike Rangers FC, FC Irtysh had properly disclosed to the licensor the correct & accurate financial information required, so the exclusion was deferred for a probationary period of (3) years.

Comment in respect of the award of a UEFA Licence in 2011 to Rangers FC.

From the foregoing it could be deduced that had Rangers FC qualified for the Champions League (or European League) and not gone bust as a result and so not entered liquidation BUT it became public knowledge by 2012 that a licence had been wrongly and possibly fraudulently granted then

Rangers would have been fined the equivalent of their earnings from their participation in the UEFA competitions in 2011

At least a two year ban from UEFA Competitions would have been imposed, but more likely three in view of repeated incorrect statements.

The consequences of both would have been as damaging for Rangers survival as the real life consequences of losing to Malmo and Maribor in the qualifying rounds of the Champions and European Leagues.

Karma eh!

Interestingly in the UEFA COMPLIANCE AND INVESTIGATION ACTIVITY REPORT 2015 – 2017 , the CFCB investigatory chamber recommended that both the Kazakhstan FA and Swiss FA as licensors

“pay particular attention to the adequate disclosure of the outstanding amounts payable towards other football clubs, in respect of employees and towards social/tax authorities, which must be disclosed separately;

Would the same recommendation apply to the Scottish FA with regard to their performance in 2011 and will the SFA responses thereafter to shareholders in a member club be examined for compliance with best governance practice by the SFA Compliance Officer investigating the processing of the UEFA Licence in 2011?

Related

Celtic fan from Glasgow living mostly in Spain. A contributor to several websites, discussion groups and blogs, and a member of the Resolution 12 Celtic shareholders' group.
Committed to sporting integrity, good governance, and the idea that football is interdependent. We all need each other in the game.

"Substantive hearings are different in Scotland. Civil trials are called “proofs”. A proof is a hearing of the evidence in a case. A proof is appropriate where there is a factual dispute between the parties……"

So, on Thursday, one party will presumably, be trying to show that he has in fact complied with both the TOP's order and the Court Order.

Is it not true that at an earlier hearing, Mr King made it plain that NOAL 'owned' the shares and it was NOAL who should make the offer? This was, as far as I can recall, accepted. NOAL are NOT based in South Africa, so DK has made a conscious decision to use a SA based trust to 'make the offer', knowing full well he cannot get the money out of the country

I was going to post something pointing out Naismith did something very similar (standing over Hendry I think, giving him pelters) later in the game? What's the justification for that one? Other than he was out of control (Naismith that is…).

I was going to post that but I decided against posting that as this site is not about pros and cons and refereeing disputes – that was one of the few rules on this site when it was setup that separated it from the many others. Wasn't the usual phrase something like "there are plenty of other websites catering to team bias and refereeing complaints"

Whit's the mods daeing Tom?

(Nae offence to the mods of course, but I'm interested in their view).

On the subject of the site – it's 4 months since the last blog was posted. TBH this site is more about the comments than the blogs, but it's not like nothings happened in the last 1/3 of a year worth writing about.

I see its a new season but the same narrative regarding our completely incompetent referees. I watched most of the EPL action at the weekend and the standard of refereeing is just night and day between what we have to put up with in Scotland. I don't believe for one minute the referees are biased either in our favour (as many on here do) or against us (as SG and most of follow follow do!). They are just inept altogether. The Moralos red card was one that could have gone either way. It reminded me of the Ronaldo incident the last group game of the World Cup where he lashed out similarly. VAR was used and the referee let him off with just a yellow, which I felt at the time set a precident as I was sure if you kick out it's a straight red. I'm not sure if that high profile example may have been used when deciding to rescind the red card or not. At that point in the Portugal game I felt the referee made up a rule that didn't exist – i.e. Ronaldo intentionally lashed out and should have been sent off, or the other player play acted in which case he gets booked for simulation. A yellow card by the very letter of the law did not exist for the referee to give yet he chose to anyway. If the red card had stood, there was not really much room for complaining as Moralos put himself in that situation to start with. The rest of the Aberdeen game the manager was poor. The penalty was either offside in which case it wasn't a penalty, or it was onside in which case its a penalty AND a red card. So whatever your views on offside/onside, the referee got that one wrong.

Yesterday's referee for the St Mirren match was just dreadful. Other than the red card decision which was 100% correct, he missed so many fouls and off the ball tackles by both sides, offsides by both sides, the tackle by McGinn at the end of the game was a red any day of the week. Again though I feel he was equally as poor for both sides over the coarse of the game.

I always think football fans view everything through rose tinted spectacles and always believe 'their' club is being unfairly treated by officials. When you take a step back and look at the last few years and key decisions going against teams, I think it evens itself out and we need to look from an outsiders point of view and realise refereeing standards in Scotland must be amongst the worst in Europe (and that's saying something as there are some dreadful referees!).

Sometimes I think technology is taking football down a road where the after-match reviews of incidents will provide bigger news than the game itself. According to a tweet by Jonathan Sutherland this is to be reviewed by the Compliance Officer too:

Hopefully this use of technology will cut out, or reduce, the thuggish behaviour in our game, but I doubt it will because for too many players it's a part of their makeup.

What annoys me most, though, is that these players are very skilful and should be good enough to rise above this kind of behaviour. For the record, in my opinion, this, and both of Naismith's kicks, should have resulted in red cards if the match officials had spotted them. I am certain that, in Naismith's case, the latest Ibrox appeal made it rather difficult for the officials to 'spot' the first, and encouraged them to go soft on the second incident.

I am not trying to do bit of whataboutery here, or tit for tat 'your guy's as bad as ours', more highlighting the problems this use of technology brings and how overturning one red card can create future problems for the game by making things harder for the referees in match situations.

In simple terms the SFA were keen to head off any criticism that Livingston's decision to close their Academy was the result of the implementation of Project Brave. However, it is actually the third club after Clyde and Falkirk to stop their investment in youth football in the last three years. Whether or not those closures are directly related to Project Brave, funding is an issue for community based clubs.

I'm pleased to see that another sex offender with previous links to youth football has been jailed, albeit for more recent offences against a teenage boy. I wonder if his late guilty plea avoided any evidence being presented about his conduct when he was coaching in Scotland.

In the last month we also heard the car crash interview with Ian Maxwell on the subject of sex abuse in youth football. Coincidentally, just last week, I was speaking to a former youth player who told me that he was coached by Gordon Neely when he was 13-14. He was quite open about what went on and explained that it was only because the youngsters didn't know any better, that it wasn't reported at the time. The youngsters did talk among themselves about the abuse, but were more concerned about avoiding making mistakes in training or games that would leave themselves the subject of Neely's "punishments". His descriptions were both graphic and horrifying.

I knew McCafferty when he was kitman at Celtic. He resigned when he was accused of abuse by a guy who later admitted in court he had made the accusation up. I remember feeling sorry for him that his dream job had been stolen from him, and surprised that Celtic didn’t offer him the job back. Now we know. The important point to make is that I totally believed in him and thought it impossible that he could be guilty of such s thing.
Probably why cretins like this get away with it for so long. People just can’t square it with the personality the individual presents to others.
One consequence of that these days is that folk who dedicate themselves to helping kids are viewed with suspicion by the rest of us. Another reason for the contempt with which we hold abusers.

LM
I am a big believer in the need to avoid double punishment. I haven’t seen the McCrorie incident but I assume it was outside the box. I think the double punishment only applies if inside. Pretty sure somebody posted the rule here recently.

On the subject of the site – it's 4 months since the last blog was posted. TBH this site is more about the comments than the blogs, but it's not like nothings happened in the last 1/3 of a year worth writing about.

easyJambo 13th August 2018 at 14:11

I'm pleased to see that another sex offender with previous links to youth football has been jailed, albeit for more recent offences against a teenage boy. I wonder if his late guilty plea avoided any evidence being presented about his conduct when he was coaching in Scotland.

————————————————————————————————-

Definite article necessary linked to the governance of Scottish football, not only can't the SFA deal with tax dodgers an imperfect registrations they are incapable to keeping children safe.

Ahhhh, so i take back my second from last paragraph as i now get why a foul outside the box is not a double punishment when red carded whereas a penalty inside the box would be double punishment. I hadnt thought about that.

In simple terms the SFA were keen to head off any criticism that Livingston's decision to close their Academy was the result of the implementation of Project Brave. However, it is actually the third club after Clyde and Falkirk to stop their investment in youth football in the last three years. Whether or not those closures are directly related to Project Brave, funding is an issue for community based clubs.

I understood that UEFA monies distributed to league members as a result of teams progressing in European competition was mandated for developing youth football? Will this mean that Livingston will not benefit next year?

Re the Naismith kick out at Hayes when he is on the ground.
The linesman is about two yards away looking straight at it (would post an image, but new blog not up to speed on that yet)
Now if the lindsman is looking straight at it. Did the linesman bottle it by not having a word in the refs ear, or did the linesman think to himself why bother.Or did the linesman look at Nasmith lashing out and think it was ok for a player to do that?
What happened to the linesman who did have a word in the refs ear about the Morales kick out?
Could anything that happened to this linesman sway the linesman who watched Nasmith lash out.
Are the refs and linesmen now worried if someone kicks out and does some serious damage and the refs and linesmen have not taken the right action,are they now worried that they are not getting the chance to do their job properly

Re the Naismith kick out at Hayes when he is on the ground.
The linesman is about two yards away looking straight at it (would post an image, but new blog not up to speed on that yet)

=============================

The linesman would have been about 25 yards away, level with the Hearts defensive line. The first image shows the line of the Hearts defence in the lead up to the incident, i.e. the assistant ref's approximate position. The second shows the incident itself, with no assistant referee in sight. I've no issue with you expressing a view on the incident, but what you describe is not backed up by the photographic evidence.

theredpill 12th August 2018 at 21:24 29 0 Rate This Prior to Rangers’ match with St Mirren in the Ladbrokes Premiership, the home support heralded the first league encounter of the season with a stunning tifo display. BEST REPLY I SEEN FOR TIFO Do you have to scan this with your iPhone to find out what it is? ———————– theredpill 13th August 2018 at 07:44 0 0 Rate This Not sure what you mean cluster one ,I used copy and paste to get it from the hootsman. ————— No one knew what the tifo was, it looked more like a QR code. Hence the Do you have to scan with your phone to find out what it is. Again would post an image of a QR code,and the tifo but blog not up to speed on that yet

Those little squares that look like a crossword puzzle mated with an ink blot.They actually have several names: QR codes (for Quick Response), Mobile Tags, and 2-D Bar Codes (1-D being the bar code the cashier swipes).

Dont take this the wrong way but you actually did not need to post your complete SPFL highlights to prove a point. You understood fine well what the rule is, there is also no such thing as going away from goal, it was a delibrate trip to stop a player whom the young player would have seen was manouvering to go round the keeper. The lad was chasing a striker and knew the danger, if you want to cheer your team thats fine but i have come across people like you growing up, guys who used to relish in Celtic defeats, so if you want to say to some of us Celtic minded GIRUY you can, if the mods let it pass,and we are fine with it.The decision was analysed and the decision stands. Now without deflecting we know Naismith and Brown have a history and they are man enough to handle themselves, lets focus on kickig a man when injured what do you say to that?
Like Shay Logan kicking a ball at Brown previous when down, both incidents when players may be in need of treatment for injuries or heaven forbid concused, i think we should lay off the whatabouteries and the nonsense, you are beginning to sound like David Edgar, he really is a nauseating wee guy when chips are down for his beloved and similar when they win.
We also know Shays wee history with Brown and Tonev, just another Saturday eh LM2, we kick on and kick on.

Dont take this the wrong way but you actually did not need to post your complete SPFL highlights to prove a point. You understood fine well what the rule is, there is also no such thing as going away from goal,

There clearly is. It states it in the rules that i posted Boab

it was a delibrate trip to stop a player whom the young player would have seen was manouvering to go round the keeper. The lad was chasing a striker and knew the danger,

Ive actually watched it again after your comment as i never thought it was deliberate. I thought he was going for the ball. I would now re-evaluate that truth be told so happy to admit that in all likelyhood he knew exactly what he was doing.

if you want to cheer your team thats fine but i have come across people like you growing up, guys who used to relish in Celtic defeats, so if you want t sat to some of us GIRUY you can and we are fine with it.

I have absolutely no idea what you mean here. I have not mentioned any result.

The decision was analysed and the decision stands.

Who analysed the decision ?

Now without deflecting we know Naismith and Brown have a history and they are man enough to handle themselves, lets focus on kickimg a man when injured what do you sat to that?

No need to deflect anything Boab. Here is what i said on Naismith 4 hours ago "Naismith is a wee gobshiet though. Cant stand players that do that, no matter who they play for or against."

Shay Logan kicking a ball at Brown when down, both incidents when players may be in need of treatment for injuries, i think we should lay off the whatabouteries and the nonsense, you are beginning to sound like David Edgar.

I have no idea about Shay Logan. I dont watch Celtic playing and only saw the Naismith incident through people talking about it on here and seeing the flashpoints on Twitter. So I also havent a clue about "whatabouteries" when i have clearly said that Naismith is a sheit and i dont like him and players of his ilk. I include Morelos in that. Scott Brown too. Alan Hutton was another one. Joey Barton as well. Sly kicks, elbows, stamps and kicks. Id change the rules so i could retrospectively send them off every game.